NEAL SCHON – Journey Through Time

This mammoth 3CD/DVD set captures legendary Journey guitarist Neal Schon and his friends live on stage in San Francisco back in 2018 when they did a charity gig to raise funds for victims of the fires that had ravaged the North Bay area of the San Francisco region in late 2017, and this release has quite a few cool things going for it. With Marco Mendoza (Thin Lizzy, Whitesnake) on bass, Deen Castronovo (Journey, Ozzy Osbourne) on drums, John Varn on keyboards, and renowned singer Gregg Rolie on vocals, Schon had a rather stellar cast of musicians to help him out that night.

One of the most appealing things about Journey Through Time is the fact that it genuinely sounds as if they are having a fabulous time on stage together and a lot of fun jamming classic material from Journey’s outputs from the seventies. The whole affair comes across as raw, intuitive, playful, and pretty damn enjoyable thanks to the eclectic setlist and the chemistry between the members of Neal’s outfit, and although the quality of the sound is akin to a decent soundboard recording and lacking clarity and definition, it succeeds in bringing a warm and inviting atmosphere to life. Not necessarily essential but it is rather awesome to hear some of those rarely played songs being aired again.